In some customer service centers, cases may be assigned to agents (e.g., analysts, specialists) for servicing. For example, insurance claims may be assigned to insurance adjusters or other agents for subrogation or other processing; patients or other insureds may be assigned to nurses, pharmacists, or other clinical support specialists; debt collectors may be assigned to debtor cases; and so on. These cases may be assigned in a variety of ways. In some customer service centers (including, for example, workflow, case management, or transaction processing service or support organizations), cases may be assigned to agents based on time of arrival. This strategy may be referred to as a “first-in, first-out”, “FIFO”, or “round-robin” strategy. In some customer service centers, management (e.g., managers or supervisors) may assign cases to agents (including other types of specialists such as those mentioned above), possibly with a particular rationale based on information known to the management, such as information about an agent's skills or historical performance. For some cases, management may have low confidence in their assignments or lack relevant information to make optimal assignments.
Also, in some customer contact centers, cases or contacts may be assigned to agents for servicing. For example, a “lead list” of contacts may be generated for each agent to contact (e.g., using an outbound dialer). These contacts may be assigned to agents using a FIFO strategy. In other environments, contacts may be assigned to agents using other methods such as management-based assignments.
In view of the foregoing, it may be understood that there may be significant problems and shortcomings associated with current FIFO or management-assigned strategies.